Blue Flu
by Tanba Josav
Summary: RayK goes to unusual measures to extract a confession and appear smarter than a Mountie.


**"Blue Flu"**

SPOILERS: None as such, unless you count that it's set early in the Third Season and you don't know about the whole Ray/Ray thing.

DISCLAIMER: All _due_ South characters belong to Paul Haggis and Alliance Communications Corporation Production. I make no money of this and am just doing it for the love of the show.

* * *

"Whaddaya mean he won't confess?" Lieutenant Welsh slathered a generous dollop of mustard on his rye roll before contemplating the array of food before him. "In case it's escaped your limited attention," he waved a slice of tomato in the vague direction of Detective Vecchio. "Your case is very circumstantial. Without a full confession your guy's gonna walk."

Two men stood before the Lieutenant's desk. One was ramrod straight and gazed intently past Welsh's left shoulder. Dressed in the traditional red uniform of a Canadian Mountie it was the ever polite – and if you asked his partner ever annoying – Constable Benton Fraser of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. To one side stood, to the casual observer, his exact opposite. Slouching to attention and staring intently at the floor in the vague hope it would open up and swallow him whole was Detective Ray Vecchio, not the real Ray Vecchio of course. He was undercover somewhere having the time of his life. No, this was Stanley Raymond Kowalski, a man who openly flirted with the department's dress code wearing dirty jeans and a rumpled tee shirt. He ran a hand through his spiky dark blonde hair and thought, once again, just why it was he had agreed to give up his life and identity to become someone else, especially this particular someone.

"Well detective?" Welsh broke through his thoughts.

"You should have let me have a crack at him, Lieutenant, instead of Huey and Dewey."

"After your last bungled attempt at an interrogation?" Welsh snorted as he continued sorting through his lunch. "We want to build a case not smash it to pieces with a harassment suit."

"I honestly thought he would crack," Ray said. "When Fraser mentioned the mud that linked him to the robbery he turned green. Now _that's _the action of a guilty man."

"Actually," Benton spoke up for the first time since they had entered the room. "That's more the actions of a hypochondriac."

"A what, now?" Ray turned to Benton in disbelief. "You're making words up again!"

"You know, a hypochondriac." Welsh said. "A person who over exaggerates."

"I believe, sir," Benton rubbed his left earlobe in an apologetic manner. Like it went against his nature to correct a superior officer, even when they were wrong. "You are referring to the use of hyperbole. A hypochondriac is someone who has a persistent anxiety about their health even to the point of inventing illnesses."

"I knew that," Welsh said.

"Ah, of course you did, Lieutenant." Benton insisted on using the British pronunciation of _Leff-tenant._

"Yeah, butt kisser." Ray muttered under his breath.

"Something you'd like to share?" Welsh continued to stack various pieces of meat into his roll.

"Well, I just think it's a bit of a stretch to get all that just from a bit of mud, even for super Mountie over here."

Benton raised his eyebrows at Ray's turn of phrase. "But you yourself, Ray, are always telling me that mud is disgusting and unhygienic. In fact I recall one time you telling me that I would 'catch something nasty', I believe your exact words were."

"No that was the _other_ Ray, I just think you're gross and weird."

"Well be that as it may, Ray, Donald Biggins is a hypochondriac."

"And you can tell that just by some stinking mud?"

"That and his use of gloves."

"Its winter," Ray threw his hands up in the air as if asking the heavens to witness the idiot Canadian he was lumped with. "Hello?"

"Ah, but he insists in wearing them indoors. Then there is the meticulous way he wipes everything clean with a sterilised cloth before touching things."

"Okay, I'll give you that he's a clean freak but that still doesn't make him a hyper-whatsis."

"All right, did you see his extreme reaction when he walked past Francesca and she sneezed on him?"

"I saw that," Welsh said.

"I thought that was everyone's reaction to Frannie?" Ray said.

"Assuming for the moment that the Constable, here, is correct" Lieutenant Welsh said as he cut the roll in half. "How can that help us?"

"I honestly don't know, sir." Benton replied. There was a faint bark from outside the closed office. "And neither does Diefenbaker."

"Oh." Welsh bit into his lunch.

Ray stood there staring out into space as various thoughts ran through his head. _'Persistent anxiety about health' . . . 'inventing illnesses' . . . 'Frannie has a cold.'_

"I have an idea!" Ray said out of the blue.

Welsh almost choked on his roll. This was a first, one of his detectives working something out before the Mountie.

Ray stepped forward and picked up one half of Walsh's lunch. "Can I borrow this?"

Without waiting for a reply he spun on his heel, almost knocking Fraser over, and left the office.

"Fraser go and tell Huey to stall for time, I'll be there in a minute." Ray snatched up Frannie's box of tissues on the way despite her wheezing protests. "Oh and tell him to just go with whatever I say in there, okay?"

Benton nodded. "Understood."

The two parted ways, Benton towards the interrogation rooms and Ray to the men's room.

Entering the men's room Ray peeked under the stall doors to make sure he was alone. Placing the Kleenex box on a nearby shelf he carefully put the food on top of it. Pulling out a handful of tissues he ran them under the tap until they were sopping wet then after wringing them out and, adding a few more dry tissues to the mix, he placed the lot gingerly into his right jean pocket. Taking up the roll he opened it up and poked around, stealing a few pieces of pastrami and sausage as he went, until he found what he was looking for – the onion!

Squeezing the vegetable between his fingers Ray stared at himself in the mirror. _Okay, so I'm not the best looking guy on the planet but I have some good qualities, right? So why the hell am I stuck here with the poster boy for moral righteousness as a partner?_ Halting that line of thought before it went too far Ray looked down at his fingers.

"The things I do for a confession," he said to himself.

With the slightest of hesitation Ray reached up and dabbed at his right eye. Instantly it started stinging as the onion juices did their work.

"Son of a –!" Ray hopped about blinking rapidly. "Damn!"

Realising that he would probably lose any resolve if he didn't act soon Ray poked at his other eye.

"Ow, ow." He staggered backward dropping the onion ball.

After a few minutes of tears he looked into the mirror. Facing him was a bleary red-eyed Ray. So far so good, now what else could he do?

"Nose, nose, gotta do something with the nose."

He pinched it a few times then, in a burst of inspiration, he rubbed it briskly against the sleeve of his tee shirt. See, there was a perfectly good reason for saving money on fabric softener! The end result was a nose not quite as red as his eyes but getting there.

Last but not least Ray practised a few deep hacking coughs then shadow boxed with himself in the mirror for a few minutes, just to get into the mood.

"You are one mean lean coughing machine," he told his reflection, picking up the tissue box and roll. "Ladies and germs, its show time!"

Three men sat in interrogation room one. They had been sitting there for almost an hour going round and round the same questions. The detectives would ask something and the prisoner would refuse to answer.

There was a polite knock on the door and Constable Fraser entered. Walking over to Huey he leant forward and whispered in the detective's ear.

"What!" Huey turned and looked at Fraser.

The Mountie just shrugged and went to stand in the corner of the room.

"What?" Dewey asked.

"Nothing," Huey turned back to the prisoner. "Now where were we? Ah yes, it would behove you to confess, Donald, I can call you Donald?" The smoothly dressed Jack Huey smiled at Biggins.

"Yeah, my partner here likes to have an informal relationship in all his interrogations." Detective Dewey added.

"Indeed," Huey peered intently at Biggins clothes. "That is a smart suit, where do you shop?"

"I refuse to say anything. Besides, I know my rights I deserve a phone call." Donald Biggins looked about the room. "You know for a public building this isn't very clean."

"Whatever!" Dewey waved a dismissive hand. "Confess already and you can go visit a nice clean cell."

The door opened again and a more than normal dishevelled Ray stumbled his way in. "Oh man," he was saying. "The things you drag me outta my bed for. Don't you guys know I'm sick!"

"Uh," Huey looked from Ray to Dewey. "What are you doing here?" he said like he was reciting from a script.

Ray waved his tissue box about the room. "Doing here?" he said. "Why I'm here to do your job of getting a confession from this guy."

With that statement he strode over to the table taking a big bite from the roll. Halfway there he began to cough spraying the three men at the table with bits of food.

Biggins gave a horrified choking squeal and tried unsuccessfully to push his chair backwards.

"Oh man, I'm sorry," Ray said around some pastrami and tomato as he pulled out the wad of sodden tissues from his pocket and tried to pat down Biggins. "Let me get that for you."

"Get back! Get back!" Biggins flailed his arms around frantically, trying to ward off Ray without actually touching him.

"Hey, its okay," Ray said, then sneezed. "I only got the flu, at least that's what the doc told me. Although I'm not sure," he looked over at Fraser. "My buddy and I arrested this guy last week he looked pretty sick and he had these great big boils under his arms, right guys?"

Ray looked over at Huey and Dewey who, after a moment's hesitation started to nod vigorously.

"Boils?" Biggins face turned greyish yellow. "What kind of boils?"

"Big huge, honking boils," Ray held his hands about an inch apart. "Right Fraser?"

Benton Fraser swallowed once then nodded. "Why, yes, Ray." He said in a rather stilted way. "That would be correct."

"Didn't that guy, like die?" Ray asked.

"Die!" Biggins threw himself out of his chair and rushed to the far corner of the room. He pulled out a large white handkerchief and held it up to his face. He pointed one shaking hand at Ray. "You're a plague carrier!"

"What!" Huey shouted as he jumped to his feet and moved away from Ray, quickly followed by Dewey.

"Oh no, I'm sure that can't be the case," Benton said. "If it was the plague half this station would be sick by now."

"But that woman outside," Biggins said. "She was sick!"

"Who Frannie?" Ray asked around a bout of hacking coughs. "But she was fine a few hours ago."

"Hey, now that you mention it," Dewey said. "I am feeling a bit ill, myself."

"Yeah, yeah." Huey added. "Is it getting hot in here or is it just me?"

"Oh no, no!" Biggins tried unsuccessfully to push his way through the wall and into the next room. "I have to get out of here!"

"How 'bout you, Fraser?" Ray asked. "How you feelin'?"

"Why I'm feeling quite well –" he caught Ray's glare and gave a feeble cough. "Actually since you pointed it out . . ."

"All of you!" Biggins began beating on the walls and screaming. "_Get me out of here! Someone please get me out of here!"_

"No can do," Ray said. "By now everyone must have it. You're only way out of here is to confess so we can move you to another precinct."

"Yes! Yes! I confess, I confess. I did it! I did everything, now please get me out of here!"

Huey whipped out a pen and fresh piece of paper. "Would you care to put that down in writing?"

"Let me get this straight," Welsh was saying afterwards. "Constable Fraser _lied_?"

"No sir!" Benton said heatedly.

"You were fudging the truth there, Fraser," Ray said. "What do you call it?"

"Acting."

"Acting?"

Fraser nodded. "Indeed, I was playing a part. In this case a part of a Canadian worried for his friend's health."

"Right," Ray drew the word out. "Whatever, buddy."

"It's not the first time I've strode the boards, so to speak. Why, I once performed the entire play of Hamlet all by myself."

"Really?" Welsh said.

"Indeed, well I had to there was only myself and my grandparents present and _someone_ had to be in the audience."

"You are so weird!" Ray stated. "Is he always this weird?" he asked Welsh.

"'Fraid so."

"Wow, tough being Canadian, huh?"

"Not at all, Ray." Benton said. "In fact I would think it would be tougher, as you put it, to be American. Your lifestyle is too fast, you are too dependent on handguns and your constant need to consume junk food –"

"Shut up, Fraser."

"Understood."

"Speaking of food," Welsh said. "You owe me a sandwich, Detective."

"Yeah, but we caught the bad guy. He confessed!"

"You still owe me my lunch."

"Couldn't you charge it to the precinct? I mean it did help in the solving of a felony?"

Welsh pointed to the door. "Dino's Deli on Twelfth Street, now!"

"Fine." Ray's shoulders slumped and he started for the door.

"And you'd better go with him, Constable," Welsh said. "Just to make sure he gets there in one piece."

"Yes, sir, Dief could use the exercise."

"Whatever." Leiutenant Welsh waved the pair away.

As the door closed he sneezed violently.


End file.
